I know this is a stupid question because I cannot think of any way to do this, but this is a Hail Mary pass. We have a pretty big sexual assault trial coming up on the 26th of this month, and a witness who was present for the events leading up to and during the assault now lives in England and is refusing to come testify for us. Short of the defense attorney's consent, can you think of any way we can get her testimony at trial through closed circuit TV or teleconference? Like I said, I know that this is not really possible, but we need some help. Thanks.

Will your witness cooperate at all? If the witness just refuses to cross the Atlantic for trial, you could do a deposition under Art. 39.02. That could be done by a teleconference, I would imagine, or even by written interrogatories under 39.06. There may be a Confrontation Clause issue here though if you try to do this without the Defendant's agreement. I haven't looked, but I would doubt that there are any cases on this procedure since State's depositions were just recently added as an option.

Personally, I'd try to take the deposition in person in England !!

If the witness is cooperative, but just doesn't want to make the trip, you could file a motion for their testimony to be taken via CCTV or a webcam. We did one last summer, granted he wasn't as far away as your witness, but he could not travel. We set up a webcam wherein the witness could see the defendant and the defendant could see the witness, so no confrontation problems. I was surprised how easy it was. I seem to remember that we could have even just had the witness go to a Kinkos and use one of their webcams.
Phillip Ray handled all the technical aspects of it, as far as setting up the cameras, etc. So Phillip, do you have any insight?
I'm not in my office today, but can email you the motion we used, if you send me your email address: lisa.tanner@oag.state.tx.us

There are alot of fancy programs out there, but MSN Messenger will work. (Free and downloadable online or comes as a part of XP.)

We really went low tech. For internet access, we ran an ethernet cable out of the Judge's chambers to a lap top in the court room. (Easily done also with a wireless connection or router.) With a webcamera pointed at a podium and a microphone on the podium, the questioner could directly view the witness on the screen of the laptop. From the Laptop, we ran a cable to the courtroom television for the jury to watch. (Using the full screen option looks great.)

Couple of tips: Put the witness in a private room with an internet connection. Have the witness wear headphones instead of using the regular computer speakers to reduce echoes and feedback. A standard web camera and microphone work great with the private room and headphones.

Make sure the TV sound is set so the jury can hear it,-- do not point it at the podium microphone, and you're all set. It sounds complicated, but it's incredibly easy to do. The best part is, there is very little expense to your long distance witness.

We had great cooperation from the prosecuting attorney's office in Colorado: they set up a private room (just someone's office), a computer with internet, and a webcam, microphone, and headphones from what they had lying around the office. (You could purchase all of those things for about 30 dollars.)

If you want to practice setting a link up, let me know. It may take as long as twenty or thirty minutes to get it running slick. Seriously, it was incredibly easy.

Drop me an email at philipray@co.potter.tx.us or call at (806) 379-2325.